steady and strong
by daughter-of-october
Summary: [Characters: Olivier Armstrong I, Olivier Mira Armstrong, Victoria Olivier Hamilton] # Summary: It is about what they are not: quitters. # Companions: this war's not over, made for gold


**_steady and strong_**

**Characters**: Olivier Armstrong I, Olivier Mira Armstrong, Victoria Olivier Hamilton

**Summary**: It is about what they are not: quitters.

**Companions**: this war's not over, made for gold

* * *

The first Olivier Armstrong had been a rebel for her time, a woman who had never accepted no as an answer. Headstrong and stubborn to the end, she had died saving her brother and she had been remembered – in her family as someone who had sacrificed herself for the sake of someone else and in Drachma as the demon woman who had taken out quite a few soldiers of theirs before she had collapsed due to her injuries and died.

She had been all about courage and the will to sacrifice everything – including the own life – for someone beloved. Her sacrifice had been quite admirable – especially given that she had defeated soldiers without being a fighter herself. It had been the desperation of a sister speaking out of her and her anger had made her a monster, someone who had had no fear left.

From this moment, the name had never been given to a child lightly because there would always be some to remember the first one and all those who would come afterwards would have to measure up to her.

For this reason, Olivier Mira Armstrong was the first one after her ancestor to carry the name because she was born with a promising gleam in her eyes. And she lived up to the name. Her career was impressive and only to be compared with the career of the former Fuhrer Jonathan Llewellyn. Whatever she did, she did with a strong sense for justice because this was what she stood for. She would not stand by the side and watch how the country her family had fought for since generations was ruined. And so she did the same as those before her: she picked a fight she knew she could not win alone.

But she did not care because she was not alone.

She had allies, people who would follow her through hell if necessary because before there had been the army, there had be the students council and those who had helped her there were still out there, in high positions everywhere in the country. Her old vice was in the south but as usual, they worked and thought in synch as they had always. The old head of the disciplinary committee was in SouthCity as well just as the treasurer and the captain of the chess team. It was strange how she always knew where they were and what they did but then again, they had been the closest she ever had to friends for years and the bond had never been torn apart.

And so, she got away with hardly any charges after the Promised Day (having an ally who is a brilliant lawyer does pay out after all) and suddenly, she realised that the legacy she carried had never been about going through everything alone, being a lone wolf. It was about making the right friends, having the right allies.

She had learned her lesson as she had sat in a room where nothing she could do would change her fate, where she had depended on the words of her old vice because this was her only hope to get away with mild punishment. And her faith paid out.

For a moment, Olivier felt free from the burden on her shoulders because her lesson to learn had been that she – like everyone else – had to trust and that there were moments. She could lean back and enjoy life because she had people who supported her and who had chosen her.

Her aspect of being Olivier was that she had learned and grew from her mistakes.

The last Olivier for the next century was not born into the Armstrong-family but she was still connected to the family as she had been born up at Briggs while her mother had been there for an inspection. Her name was Victoria Olivier Hamilton and through many strange circumstances that were difficult to explain, Olivier Armstrong needed up as godmother. The girl was highly intelligent – smart enough to go with her head straight through a wall and get away with it because her plans were always successful. She shared the will to sacrifice everything – her godmother lost count of how many relationships the young woman gave up on just to reach her goals – but she also learned from her mistakes and became a better person eventually.

But in the end, as someone went and wrote a book about them, it was not about what made them different from each other. It was not about the way the first one gave up on herself, the way the second learned from her faults and surpassed herself eventually or the way the third one used her intelligence to get whatever she wanted.

It was about the trait they all shared.

It was about the way the first glared at her opponents in defiance, the way the second simply did not know the meaning of giving up or the way the third did shove the words 'a woman cannot rule a country' down her haters' throats as she became chancellor.

It was about the way they followed their dreams and chased them down if necessary – the way they never quitted halfway.


End file.
